Should You Question God?

here tonight? Who else is excited to be here tonight? Great. Who else is excited about heaven? Heaven, yes. Heaven is going to be great. Heaven is something we talk about a lot in our house. A lot. We actually talked about heaven on the way here today. Paul tells us in Philippians 1.23 that it will be a far better place than this. So we told our kids, imagine the greatest place in the whole world. Heaven's going to be so much better. So our kids are always imagining what heaven's going to look like and what it's going to be like. 100% of the time, there are water slides in heaven. Usually the kids can fly. Often there's clouds that they can jump on. And my daughter is convinced that God is going to let her switch and become a dog one day and a bird a different day. She's convinced. I don't know, maybe. I don't know. I do know that based on the book of Revelation's description of heaven, there's going to be streets of gold and there are going to be walls of precious jewels and gates of pearls and a river of life going through the middle of it. I also know there are going to be many mansions because Jesus said, in my Father's house there are many mansions and I will go prepare a place for you. So there's going to be a special place just for us there. It's going to be a home. It's going to be happy. Revelation 21.4 says there will be no death, no mourning, no crying, and no pain. What a wonderful place that will be. But this, this is not heaven. This earth that we live on, it's not our home. It's not wonderful. And unfortunately this place where we live right now is filled with death and mourning and crying and pain. God knew it would be. And that's why in Isaiah chapter 43, verse 2, he says, when you pass through waters, I will be with you. When you pass through rivers, they will not sweep over you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned. He said when because he knew. He knew that we were going to face many, many trials while we're on this earth. But he's telling us I will be there with you. I will be walking through those trials with you. When difficult things happen in our life, we generally have one or two responses. We either turn towards God to comfort us or we turn away from God. And all too often when something bad happens, people turn away. All too often they blame God for the bad things that happen in their life. They get angry. Sometimes we push God away. We become indifferent to him and we start depending on ourselves to get us through our situations. And that's what the enemy wants. He wants us to blame God. But the enemy is the one the Bible tells us that comes to steal, kill, and destroy, not God. God

comes to bring us life and bring it in abundance. But the enemy is tricking us. So many people are tricked thinking that God is causing bad things. The enemy wants us to feel that way. So how do we not feel that way? What do we do? What do we do? How do we handle a situation that's really difficult when we're going through a really hard time in our life? When there's something tough that we just don't understand? Well, the answer I'm going to give you might surprise you. The answer is we question God. Now you might say, Katie, I could never question God. God created the universe. It's blasphemous to even think that we could question God. But God wants us to. And I'm going to show you that tonight. I want you to think for a minute about your very best friend here on earth, the person that you're very, very close to. The person that it doesn't matter if they just show up at your house and your house is a mess. It doesn't matter if you never combed your hair or put your makeup on. The person you want to do everything with. The person you can't wait to see. The person you can't wait to tell about your day. The person that you can share your deepest. desires and tell about your greatest fears. That person for me is my husband. He's my best friend. I love spending time with him. We literally work together all day. Then we raise our kids together all night and I just can't wait for the day like when we get to go to lunch together too. When he's gone on a trip, he was traveling. Oh, I just couldn't wait for him to call me so that I could tell him about my day. We have a very close and special relationship. That's the kind of relationship God wants to have with each of us. God wants a real, authentic, open relationship with us. One where we can't wait to spend time with him. Where we think, oh, I'm so glad that got canceled

because now I get to spend more time reading my Bible. One where we can't wait to get up in the morning and go into prayer and we're excited when church lasts longer because we get to spend more time in the house of God. God wants that closeness with us. He wants to know our deepest desires and he wants to know our greatest fears. Now, if my husband did something that I didn't understand, because of our relationship, I could go to him and say, why did you do that? Like, that doesn't make sense. That's not normal. Why would you say that? Or if we weren't close, I wouldn't feel comfortable asking him that question. Well, if we have a relationship with God, we can ask him those questions too and he wants us to. He wants us to go to him and say, why? I don't understand. An example of this in the Bible today that we're going to talk about is the prophet Habakkuk. Now, Habakkuk lived at a time when everything seemed to be going wrong. The world was full of corruption. His land was filled with violence, hatred, and evil. Spiritual conditions were at an all-time low. It's very much like the world we live in today. And Habakkuk wanted to know why these things were happening. So he went to God and asked him.

So I'm going to be reading Habakkuk. I'm in chapter one, verses two through four is where I'm going to start. Now, I'm using the amplified version today because it had some words that I just liked a little bit better. And so it's not going to be on the PowerPoint because we don't have the amplified version on the PowerPoint. So I'm just going to read it. If you have your Bibles, you can turn to it. Habakkuk, it's Old Testament, kind of near the end. Not a common book that we often preach from, but it's a good one. So Habakkuk one, verses two through four says, oh Lord, how long will I call for help and you not hear? I cry out to you violence, yet you do not save. Why do you make me see iniquity and cause me to look on wickedness? For destruction and violence are before me. Strife continues and contention arises. Therefore, the law is ineffective and ignored and justice is never upheld. For the wicked surround the righteous. Therefore, justice becomes perverted. He's saying, God, why are bad things happening? Why are they happening to me? Why are they happening to this country? Why is there violence? Why is there wickedness?

Why aren't you doing something? Why aren't you saving me? Why aren't you stepping in and fixing this? You'll notice that unlike the other prophetical books in the Old Testament, this one's not written to the people. This is a personal conversation between Habakkuk and God that God wanted recorded so that we could see what kind of conversation we could have with God. So we could see an example of the way that we can talk to God. And God, when Habakkuk says all these things to him, God doesn't rebuke him. God doesn't say, how dare you question me? God answers him. In chapter, or in verse five, he says, the Lord replied, look among the nations, see, be astonished and wonder, for I am doing something in your days you would not believe if I told you. He's saying, I am doing something big. I am doing something great. I promise I'm there with you. You just can't see it yet. God is always working. God is always doing something. God always has a plan. Sometimes we just can't see it where we're standing. Habakkuk, that wasn't a good enough answer for him. So he actually goes on in verses 13 and 14 to ask God again. He says, your eyes are too pure to approve evil and you cannot look favorably on wickedness.

Why then do you look favorably on those who act treacherously? Why are you silent when the wicked destroy those more righteous than they? Why do you make men like the fish of the sea, like reptiles and creeping things that have no ruler and are helpless against their enemies? He's saying, I don't understand why these things are happening. I still don't understand God. You're supposed to be a good God. Why are bad things happening? Why do you allow bad things to happen to good people and good things to happen to bad people? Have you ever asked God that question? When you see someone bad being blessed or something bad happening to someone good? I think it's a common question. I know I've asked God that question. I actually one time asked God that question because someone wonderful, just a wonderful Christian man died. And I said, God, that's not fair. He was such a good person. He was taken too early in this life. Why would you allow this wonderful human being to die when there are all these bad people out there? They're doing bad things. And selfishly, I said, why couldn't one of those people die instead? And do you know what God said to me? He said, Katie, I haven't reached them yet. They need more time. They need more time for someone to tell them about Jesus. I couldn't see the bigger picture, just like Habakkuk. But you'll notice when Habakkuk is talking, he's questioning God. But he doesn't question God's goodness. He's saying, God, you're too good for this to happen.

He's not questioning God's goodness. He's not assuming that God is bad, and that's why these things are happening. He didn't assume, well, there must not be a God. Often, when something bad happens, that's our first response, well, there must not be a God. Or this God everyone talks about is so great. Why is this happening? But not Habakkuk. He knew that God was good. He didn't turn away. He just questioned God. Now when we question God, it is good to have the right motive. It's not about our pride. It's not about proving that we know more than God. It's not about questioning his authority. Psalm 912 tells us, he forgets not the cry of the humble. When we come in humbleness, we can ask why. And God is big, and God is powerful. He can handle our whys. Habakkuk desperately wanted to understand, just as I'm sure there are times that you desperately want to understand why you're going through something, why you're in a situation, why something happened. He's not the only one in the Bible that questioned God. The Bible is actually filled with what's called laments. A lament is sharing honest emotions to God when life is not going as planned. That's the definition. Laments express sorrow and grief. Today in the world, we generally tend to hide our emotions. We just pretend everything is okay. Or we seek false saviors like food, drugs, alcohol, work.

In biblical times, though, they shared their laments. David, if you read the book of Psalms, it's full of laments that David, crying out to God when he was going through something difficult. The book of Lamentations, the entire book was written by Jeremiah, crying out to God because he didn't understand why Jerusalem was being destroyed. There's a couple of specific cries and questions that I just want to read to you tonight. You'll have to excuse me as I'm using my phone as my Bible tonight, but the first one is in the book of Judges. Chapter 6, verse 13, and it's Gideon. If you were here, I think about two months ago, I did a message on Gideon and we talked about him. and how God had this big plan for him, but Gideon wasn't, he didn't think he was the right guy for the plan, and he was kind of upset with God because of things that were going on in the situation. And I just want to read this verse, these words that he said to God. He said, Judges chapter six, verse 13, but Gideon said to him, God, please, my Lord, if the Lord is with us, then why has all of this happened to us? And where are all of his wondrous works which our father told us about when they said, did not the Lord bring us up from Egypt? But now the Lord has abandoned us and put us into the hand of the Midian. He says, God, where are you? Bad things are going on in the world. Bad things are happening, I don't see you. Where are you?

I want to go to the book of Job. Job, we all know Job had some really terrible things happen in his life. God didn't cause them, he did allow them. And he lost his family, he lost his home, he lost all his wealth, he lost everything. And he cried out to God in chapter three, verses 11. He said, why did I not just die at birth? Come forth from the womb and expire. Why did the knees receive me? And why the breast that I would nurse? For now I would have been laying down and would have been quiet. I would have slept them and would have been at rest in death. Saying, why was I even born? Why am I even here? If bad things were just going to happen in my life, why would I even live this life? I know a lot of people that ask that question. Why am I even here? Why was I even born? But this last one really shows us how you can question God, because even Jesus questioned God. In Matthew 27, verse 46, when he said, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? God allows us to ask. Now questions, questions can help us mourn

when we're dealing with a loss. Questions can help us communicate our frustrations and they can help us express our feelings. The Bible warns us not to harden our hearts. So if we harden our heart towards God, that's what's happening when we turn away. But if we open our hearts and become vulnerable with our questions, then our hearts aren't hardened and God can speak to our hearts. He can reach us deep in our souls. Questions help us realize that we can't solve our own problems, even though we try. Questions are not a sign of weakness. They actually take great courage and strength to open yourself up and share your emotions. You can connect on a deep level with God our Father when you communicate with him in this way. Ephesians 1. 1, 18 and 19 says, I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his holy people and the incomparably great power for us who believe. If you allow your heart to be open, then you can see, you can see his power, you can see his glory, you can see hope. After Habakkuk went on to ask God all these questions, in chapter two, verse one, he said,

I will stand at my guard post and station myself on the tower and I will keep watch to see what he will say to me and what answer I will give when I am reproved. He said, I'll wait, I'll wait. I asked you my questions, I cried out to you, I opened my heart, now I'll wait because I have hope in you. I have hope that you're going to answer me, that I'm going to get to see the things that you say I'm going to get to see. He says, I won't worry anymore, I won't keep begging, I'm just going to wait. God actually answered him. He answered him right away and I'm not going to read that answer tonight because God gave him a specific answer to a specific question about a specific event at that time and that's not really our focus here. Our focus is the relationship that the two of them had and the ability that Habakkuk had in his comfort with God to question him. I think another really. The important lesson is that we see Habakkuk go directly to God when he had issues. He didn't grumble, he didn't complain, he didn't go to his friends, he didn't go to his spouse, he didn't talk about it at work, he didn't put it on social media. He didn't go say, well, I don't know why God's doing all this, and I don't know what the problem is here, and I don't know why I'm going through this. He didn't. He went to God, and he asked God.

Too often we get stuck grumbling and complaining about our situations. We see how that worked out for the Israelites who grumbled and complained and spent 40 years wandering the desert. But God knows that our mouth can get us in trouble sometimes, right? The Bible tells us that life and death are in the power of the tongue. Do you know when Joshua took the Israelites, when God said, go to Jericho, you're going to take the city of Jericho, okay, God gave them a plan. And the plan was that they were to march around the city one time every day for six days, and then on the seventh day, march seven times around the city. And then they were going to shout really loud and blow their horns, and God told them the walls of Jericho are going to come tumbling down. But do you know that God commanded them to be silent during that? Silent. They couldn't talk. Because you know if they were talking, they'd be saying, well, this is stupid, why are we walking around? I don't know how God's going to work in this situation. I don't know where God is, can't he just come take care of this for me? I don't know why we have to do this. They'd be complaining amongst each other. Well, I don't know why we have to deal with this. I don't understand. They'd be upset. But guess what? When you can't talk, the only person that you can still communicate with is God. So their only option, if they didn't know what was going on, was to talk to God. And guess what? It worked, right? On the seventh day, when they finally shouted, the walls of Jericho came tumbling down. The same thing happened with Zechariah.

In the New Testament, an angel came to him and said, you and your wife are going to have a baby. And he said, no. My wife is too old. And guess what? They made it so he couldn't speak the entire pregnancy. He couldn't speak until that baby was born. It worked in his situation, too, because that baby was John the Baptist, who went on to pave the way for Jesus Christ. God wants us to seek him, and then he wants us to sit back and trust him. His answer may not always be what we hope for. It may not always be what we expect, but he always has an answer. And he always has a plan. And his plan is good. Habakkuk, it's a great book for reminding us that there are limitations in our perspective. We don't know God's way. We can't understand the bigger picture of everything that's going on, but the Bible tells us God's ways are not our ways. His ways are much, much, much better than our ways. There was a time in my life when I was going through something really difficult. And I was really vulnerable. I didn't understand why I had to go through what I had to go through. It was a really difficult time in my life. And I was in my room, on my knees, praying to God. And I'm tearing up, and I'm saying, God, I don't understand. I just want to know. I just want to understand. And I opened my heart to him, and I was very vulnerable, and I said, I don't understand why I have to go through this. And it's funny, the radio was on in the background playing Christian music, and it was a station,

probably K-Love. And while I'm praying, they take a call from a little boy. The boy was about 10 years old, and he lived on a farm. And he starts talking, and I just, something in me said, listen to what this boy has to say. A 10-year-old boy. And the little boy was telling a story about how he had this cow that had a calf. And he was there, and he got to help deliver the calf, but the calf was born sickly. And the boy decided he was going to take care of it, and bring it back to life. And he just took care of that calf, and he gave it medicine, and he fed it with a bottle, but the calf died. And the boy said he was so upset, but he went to God, and he said, God, I don't understand why this calf died. I was doing everything right. I prayed for the calf. Why did it have to die? And this little boy said on the radio, he said, God answered me, but he didn't tell me why. What he said was, I know how you feel. I know what it's like to lose. I know what it's like to feel pain. I know what it's like to suffer. I lost my son. I had to watch my son go through horrible things and be killed. I know exactly how you feel and I'm here for you. I'm here to comfort you if you need me. God wants to comfort us. He wants to be there for us. He knows what we're going through.

He knows the difficult things that we're facing on this earth. And he says, lean on me, I'm here for you. I'm gonna walk through this with you. I'm going to be there with you. He doesn't judge our sorrow. Because of his amazing compassion, he cares deeply about how we feel. He's not too far away. He's not too busy. He's not going to minimize our pain. Psalm 56, eight actually says he bottles our tears. Regardless of how trivial we may think God thinks what we're going through, he is present. He is next to us collecting our tears to comfort us during our grief. He just says, trust me. And God tells Habakkuk this same thing. He tells Habakkuk in chapter two, verse four, he says, the righteous will live by faith. Some versions might say the just will live by faith. This is one of the greatest verses in the Bible. It's quoted multiple times in the New Testament. It's in Romans, Hebrews, it's in Galatians. He's saying, have faith in me. I may not know why, I may not understand, but God, I'm going to trust you. I'm going to have faith. We need to remember, though, that our faith is not dependent on our emotions.

We can have emotions. God made us to have emotions, and he cares about our emotions. But our faith needs to be dependent on the truth, and God's word is truth. Now, I have a little experiment we're gonna do. Kenzie's gonna help me with it. Just to give you a little example of how this works, a little science experiment about our feelings. Kenzie doesn't know what she's doing here, but I promise it won't be scary. Have a seat, Kenzie. All right, I'm gonna hand you the microphone in just a second, but what I'm going to do, I'm gonna blindfold her, and then I'm gonna spin her. And I'm gonna ask her to tell me whether I'm spinning her clockwise or counterclockwise. And then I'm gonna ask her to tell me when I slow down, when I stop, and when I switch directions, okay? That's it, simple questions. Which direction am I going? When I slow down, when I stop, and when I switch directions, okay? Can you guys see her? Okay, I'm gonna hand this to you. And I'm gonna put a blindfold on you, because you can't see. If you see, it doesn't work. And I've never tried this with Kenzie,

so we're going by faith that this experiment's gonna work. Oh no, ow, ow. I'm gonna double it, because that one's a little steep. Oh darn. Sorry, I'm gonna try not to mess up your hair. Can you see? No. Okay, close your eyes just to be on the safe side, okay? I have to anyway, because I'm tired. Okay. Okay, what do I do? Okay, I'll tell you. Talk into the microphone so we can all hear you. Okay. What direction am I spinning you? Clockwise. Clockwise. Now I want you to tell me when I slow down, when I stop, and when I switch directions, okay? Slow down. Stopped. Switched. Switched. Thank you, you're done. Okay. That's it. Her feelings told us, told her, that we switched directions, didn't it? Yes, you can go. I did this experiment last week,

and I was absolutely 100% certain I switched directions. I did this experiment with all of my kids. They all told me absolutely they switched directions, but I never once spin that chair in the other direction, did I? No, but my feelings told me I did. I looked at my circumstances and how things were going and what I was expecting to happen. But Nanette told me I switched directions. I told Kenzie, the chair started spinning the other way, but it didn't, because she was trusting her feelings. And often when we go through things in this earth, we trust our feelings. We trust our emotions. And again, God created us to have emotions, but our emotions can't make our decisions for us. Our faith has to make our decisions for us, because there are times when we're going to feel like God's not there. And there are times when we're gonna feel like he's turned his back on us. And there are times when we are gonna feel like nothing is working out and we're surrounded by evil and there's bad everywhere. We're gonna feel like God's not doing anything. We're gonna feel like he's not stepping in. He's not saving us. He's not fixing the problem. That's how we're gonna feel. But God says, don't trust your feelings.

Trust the word of God, which says I'm there, which says I'm walking with you, that says I'm working something out for your good. Because of our flesh, sometimes a progression of doubt is necessary to get us to a place of faith. And we need to hold onto the fact that God is in control. He says, in this world, we will face temporary trials, but guess what, he has overcome the world already. In John chapter nine, there's a story about Jesus and the disciples and they came upon a blind man. And they were trying to figure out why the man was blind. They were trying to figure it out what happened. Someone must have sinned to cause this man to be blind. They said, was it his mother? Did his mother sin? Was it his father? Why was this man born blind? And they asked Jesus. But Jesus wants us to move past the why into the how. Because Jesus turned their questions around. It's not about why he was born blind. It's about how can this situation glorify God? How can the things that we go through in life bring others to Christ? Well, guess what, Jesus was able to heal this man and this man was able to go tell everyone he knows about Jesus and Jesus is saving power. God wants us to ask the why, but then move into the how. He wants us to say, how can the pain that I'm feeling help someone else?

How can my despair be a blessing to someone else? How can this trauma I'm going through glorify God? How can I use this situation to tell people about Jesus? Well, we can see what happened to the people I talked about earlier who opened up to Jesus and cried out to him. Gideon, Gideon went on and defeated his enemies. And Job, the Bible says he was blessed doubly. He got back double what he lost. And Jesus, we all know what happened there, right? Victory was won for the entire world because of what Jesus went through. And Kenzie, since you're in here, you might as well come on up if you don't mind. Habakkuk goes on in chapter three, verses 17 through 19. He says, though the fig tree does not blossom and there is no fruit on the vine, though the yield of the olive fails and the fields produce no food, though the flock is cut off from the fold and there are no cattle in the stalls, yet I will choose to rejoice in the Lord. I will choose to shout in exultation in the victorious God of my salvation. The Lord God is my strength, my source of courage, my invincible army. He has made my feet steady and sure like Heinz' feet, and he makes me walk forward with spiritual confidence on my high places of challenge and responsibility. He said, I will choose to rejoice in the Lord,

even though bad things are happening, even though I don't understand, even though it doesn't look like what I want it to look like, I will choose to rejoice in the Lord. I will choose to have faith in God. God knows about our difficult times, but he promises in Jeremiah 33, three, that if we call on him, he will answer us. He will answer us. Scripture doesn't tell us to pretend like everything's fine and shut up. our emotions off. And actually, we need to address our own wounds before we can help others address theirs. The laments in the Bible actually are considered a form of worship, even though they start off with deep, heartfelt grief and sorrow, questioning God. They turn into shouts of joy and triumph when the person decides they're going to trust in God. There's a gradual move from doubt to faith. Honest emotions are a pathway to healing. Questions are a channel for transformation. A lament represents a journey for our souls. And if you're going through something difficult, I hope that you start a journey today. If you're facing some difficult times, start by questioning God. Turn towards God. Don't harden your heart against Him. Open your heart up to Him so that He can speak to you and show you beautiful and wonderful things. Cry out to Him. Put your guard down and just say, why? Why is this happening? That why could change your life. It could change everything. And then wait. Wait on God. Have faith. Rejoice in Him. And you will see victory. Now, I don't want to do an altar call tonight. I just want us to pray together. Would you guys stand with me? I just want to pray tonight because I know there are people out there that are going through some really difficult things and they didn't know. They didn't know that they could question God. They thought that they had to just go through life on their own, figuring their own things out. And I believe that God is touching someone's heart today and that someone's going to say, God, why? And that person, those people, whoever

it may be, they're going to go on. They're going to start the journey of progression from doubt to faith. And I believe that their faith is going to get stronger and stronger and stronger and that one day they're going to do amazing things for the kingdom of God and they'll be changing the world. So that may be you. That may not be you. But I just want to pray for whoever's hardened their heart against God. Anyone that's turned away from him during their difficult times. Heavenly Father, I thank you for your word. I thank you for the relationship that you have with us. I thank you that you call on us to speak to you, that you want to develop a deep and intimate relationship with us, that you want us to trust you enough to ask you why things are happening. Lord, I know we live in a broken world and I know there are bad things and I know that there are people out there today suffering, Father, but that you're with them. I thank you that you're walking with each and every one of us through every trial that we face, through every negative thing, through every bad thing. You are there with us, walking, holding our hand because you know exactly how we feel. You know exactly what we're going through and you have such compassion for us because you are such a loving and wonderful and amazing, graceful God. Lord, I just pray tonight that hearts are opened to you. I pray tonight that these words that were spoken, your words out of your book, I pray that they plant seeds in someone's heart, Lord God, that those seeds start to sprout forth and that people start coming to you, that they start having faith in you, that they start understanding what an amazing God you are. I pray that if there's anyone out there tonight that doesn't know you, that through their questions they can come to know you, that through their doubt they can come to faith, that through their sorrow they can come to joy. Father, I just thank you so much that you're willing to go on that journey with us and that you're willing to be patient while we figure things out, Lord, and I thank you that one day we won't have to deal with pain and suffering anymore, that one day we will go to heaven and there will be no mourning, there will be no sorrow, there will be no grief. Father, I just thank you for your love, for your kindness. I thank you for your son, Jesus Christ, that makes it all possible, and it's in his mighty name that we pray. Amen.